Revealing Annie - Freya Barker Page 0,96
the pleasure?” Mel says when she answers.
“Have you seen The Star?” I snap.
“Not in the habit to read the gossip columns, so why don’t you tell me why?”
I explain the situation to her.
“Is that even legal?” I want to know.
“You do know I’m a family lawyer, right?” When I don’t answer, she sighs dramatically before she adds. “But I suppose I can find out, although my guess is there’s little you can do about it now. It’s already out there. My advice is to let it die down. The likelihood is, every now and then when Hollywood has a slow week; someone may come up with the idea to check in on old Annabel Fiore. You’re gonna have to live with it.”
“I don’t like that answer.”
“Tough. You’re gonna have to live with it. This stuff comes with the package. Unless…” I growl at her implication and she starts laughing. “That’s what I thought. Suck it up, buttercup. You’ve got a good thing going.”
“Fine. I assume you’ll be sending me a bill for your time?”
“Ha! You better believe it.”
The next moment I have dead air.
I’m still annoyed when I get home.
“What’s wrong?” Annie asks, meeting me at the door.
“Tired,” I lie, trying to pass her but she plants herself squarely in front of me.
“What’s wrong?” she repeats, looking worried. “Bad call?”
I immediately feel guilty. So what if some moron gets his kicks from taking snapshots. I get to come home to a house smelling of vanilla and sugar, and a beautiful woman I can’t imagine life without.
Shaking off any residual irritation, I take her face in my hands and kiss her deeply.
“I love you.”
“So does that mean you’re not tired?” she says with a hopeful smile, and my mind immediately dives in the gutter.
“Nah. Bryce is at school, right?”
I grin at her and start backing her up to the stairs.
“Yes, but wait.” She plants both hands on my chest. “Let’s save that for later.”
“Later?”
“Yeah, I want you to come with me.” She looks a little nervous.
“Where are we going?”
“You’ll see.” She puts her coat on, grabs my hand, and pulls me to the door. “We’re taking the Volvo.”
“Fine, but only if I get to drive.”
She hasn’t let me drive her new toy yet. She narrows her eyes at me when I hold out my hand.
“That’s blackmail.”
“Oh, I know.”
She tries to wear me down with her stare until she finally concedes, “Fine,” and drops the keys in my hand. I make my way over to the driver’s side and open the door. “But don’t touch the settings, I’ve just—”
I already have the seat a mile back and the steering wheel tilted up.
“I’ll put it back for you,” I promise, grinning at her.
“Famous last words.”
She directs me up Florida Road. This is familiar territory for me, not only because Keith lives up here, but this area is also where I’d been looking last year.
“Are we going to Keith and Autumn’s?” I ask, when she tells me to turn right onto the dead-end road their house is on.
“No, just keep going.”
Up ahead I see the familiar real estate sign, except it has a smaller SOLD sign across the front. That last little balloon of hope I’d been holding onto deflates. Fuck.
“What are we doing here?” That didn’t exactly come out too friendly and Annie looks like I slapped her. “I’m sorry, that came out wrong.”
She forces a smile, making me feel like an even bigger asshole.
“I have a basket in the back, would you mind grabbing that for me?”
“A little cold for a picnic, isn’t it?”
“It’s not bad.”
I get the basket, as she grabs a quilt from the back, and follow her up the incline to the top. There I set it down and walk up to the edge. This view is what I’d hoped to look at from my living room window.
“This is the land, isn’t it?” she asks behind me. “The property you had your eye on?”
“It was.”
I’m not quite sure why she’d bring me up here if she knew this was the property. Seems a little insensitive, which is unusual for her.
“Would you like to open the basket?”
Puzzled, I turn around to find her standing beside it, her hands clasped in front of her.
“What’s going on?”
“I wanted to come up here to give you your early birthday present.”
“My birthday isn’t until December.”
“That’s why it’s an early present,” she fires back, rolling her eyes. “Open it.”
The first thing I see is an envelope and I pull it out.
“This?”
“That first, yes.”
I scan the